


hail to whatever you found in the sunlight

by Anonymous



Category: Monsta X (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Arranged Marriage, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Royalty, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-10-16
Updated: 2016-10-17
Packaged: 2018-08-22 16:06:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,684
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8291951
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: When Kihyun is three-and-ten he is betrothed to the son of a Lord from the South.





	1. i.

**Author's Note:**

> this will probably have some similarities to game of thrones but i wouldn't say it's set in that universe.

_and the weather changes not halfway between your house and mine_

 

 

 

When Kihyun is three-and-ten he is betrothed to the son of a Lord from the South. He decides he hates his future husband before he even meets him.

“Kihyun,” his mother says softly, petting his hair. “I know you have no desire to marry this boy but - I am asking you to please trust that your father and I would not promise you to him if we were not sure this was what was best for you. He will make a good husband and he will treat you well.”

“Do you know him?” Kihyun counters, eyes hard and jaw set. His mother sighs, with a small sad smile, and shakes her head. “Then forgive me, mother, but how are you so sure of his character?”

“You will live a good life, Kihyun,” His father’s gruff voice comes from behind him. He is a fair, just and well-liked Lord, whose voice commands respect, “you will be a good husband and you will be treated well in return. The South is beautiful and the land is rich and one day you may learn to love it.”

Kihyun scoffs, and mumbles under his breath, “I do not think that very likely.”

 

#

 

Kihyun is the third son of the six children of the richest Lord in the North. His mother is a noblewoman who once lived on the coast, and salt and snow thrum in each of her children’s blood. His family live in a castle surrounded by high walls and dress in furs skinned from wolves.

High-born third sons are always - they can find themselves in odd positions. First and second sons are usually married off for heirs, to good noble-born daughters who will make good Lady’s. For third born sons, this is less necessary. Third born sons are married off for land, for peace or simply to unite families in the eyes of the law. And so, over the years, it’s become common practice for third sons to marry sons and daughters to marry daughters. After all, the further down the line of succession we go, the less urgent the need for heirs becomes.

Kihyun is fourth in line for his father’s seat as a Lord of the North - behind his oldest brother, his newly born son, and his second brother. His brothers will have more children, though, and Kihyun will drift farther and farther from reign. His three sisters, when they age, will be married off around the continent and may become Lady’s themselves. Only time will tell.

Kihyun doesn’t much mind that he will never be a reigning Lord. He doesn’t think himself very much suited to rule.

 

#

 

Kihyun has never met any Southern nobles. He has known southern common folk, who have migrated from the high taxes of the South to inexpensive living of the North. Kihyun’s own wet nurse had been from as far South as South goes, obvious in her darker skin, her dark eyes and hair. As he grew Kihyun remembers her telling him stories of flat-cracked earth that stretched for miles and how far apart even the smallest bodies of water were.

Kihyun’s betrothed is not from as nearly far South as his wet nurse had been. But Kihyun was a Northerner, nearly as far North as anyone could go, and so many things seemed very far South for him.

Kihyun has never met a Southern Lord but he has heard stories. Word travels, as word is want to do, even to the farthest reach of the snowy Northern peaks. Kihyun’s smart, his teachers have always told him so, and he knows that sometimes stories are simply that. He knows they become inflated for the sake of being interesting and bastardized more and more with every retelling. Kihyun is even smarter than most, though, and so he also knows that stories are usually born out of truth.

The cruelest Lords have always been Southern, the ones who burn cities and raise taxes and lock themselves among decadence while their people starve. None of these Southern Lords exist now, but the reputation remains. They are known to be greedy, to be indulging of certain pleasures.

Perhaps it’s symptom of the sunlight and of all the fruit the trees in the South grow.

Kihyun imagines his betrothed as the spoiled, fat son of a Southern Lord who thinks himself better than most. Kihyun had been raised to believe he was no better than common folk, that fate had simply blessed his birth to be among the nobles, but he could not imagine Southern babies were taught the same.

 

#

 

“Your betrothed is coming to visit with his family in a month’s time,” Kihyun’s mother tells him. He is five-and-ten now, and he’s been waiting for this day to come. “When he leaves, you will go with him, my child.”

Kihyun does his best not to cry in front of anyone. He is ice and stone and salt and he will not let himself melt to tears in front of others. When he is a lone in his chambers he cries, the first night his mother tells him and the day they receive the raven that the Lord from the South shall arrive soon, and then promises himself he will never do so again.

  
#

 

The day the Southern Lord arrives with his three sons it is snowing, a fitting welcome from the North, and his family is draped in too-thin robes of ripe-fruit orange, not bright but not muted, a color that looks of good health, and sun-golden yellow. They look bold against the grey dirt and white snow of the North.

“We will fetch you wolfskins immediately, my friends,” Kihyun’s father tells the Southern Lord, sending of a page boy to do as he says. It is not long before the boy returns and the Lord’s servants begin draping the furs over the Southerners shoulders.

The Lord from the South seems older than both Kihyun’s mother and father, his hair a stone grey and wrinkles set deep into the corners of his eyes. It seemed this Lord has only sons, three of them, with the first two seeming much older than the third boy.

“Son,” The Southern Lord barks after he is wrapped in some of Kihyun’s families heaviest wolfskins, made for the coldest of winters. It is still the early months of winter but Kihyun supposes that Southern blood is not used to even the mildest of cold, cutting winds. “Come forward,”

The two older looking sons do not move. They each wear swords around their hips and are broad-shouldered. Kihyun hears his youngest sister whisper to second youngest, asking if Southerners could have giant’s blood in them.

The third son steps forward. He is smaller than his brothers and, Kihyun would say, much more handsome. He still possesses defined muscle and strong looking arms, but there is a soft quality to him, and boyhood has not completely left his face yet.

“Introduce yourself,” The Lord from the South directs his son, patting him on the shoulder.

The third son bows to Kihyun’s father. Kihyun watches his, face expressionless and set that way, like carved marble. He realizes, now, that this must be his betrothed.

“My lord,” the third son says, “I am Hoseok, third son of my father and first of his name, and I am very honored to meet you.” Kihyun’s father acknowledges Hoseok’s honorifics and instructs the boy to stand straight again. Then he turns to Kihyun, “I am very honored to meet you as well, Kihyun,”

Kihyun flushes, from what feels like head to toe. The way Hoseok says his name makes heat pool in his stomach.

Kihyun feels like burrowing into the snow and freezing himself to death when Hoseok smirks at him and he hears his sister’s giggle at his expense.


	2. ii.

Hoseok is. He’s very handsome. He is not what Kihyun had expected, to say the least. His skin is warm-looking, the golden hue that comes from living life in the sun, and his features are soft and the kind you would like to commit to memory. Kihyun is not sure how a man like the Lord from the South managed to put such a beautiful baby inside of his wife.

They have a feast to celebrate the arrival of the Southerners. They serve dark ale and salted meat that has been smoked for hours and seasoned with the most expensive spices in the kitchen. There are potatoes from the most recent harvest, boiled to softness, served with small, plump tomatoes.

They sit Kihyun next to his second oldest brother on one side and Hoseok on the other. Kihyun does not speak because he is not sure what to say, just saws off pieces of his meat and chews quietly.

“We do not have meat like this in the South,” Hoseok says halfway through the evening, gazing at a piece of his meat speared by his fork. He plops it into his mouth, chews and swallows, and continues speaking. “We eat simple meats. This is much more gamy.”

Kihyun swallows a mouthful, “it’s bear,” he offers quietly. When he turns his head to look at Hoseok, his betrothed is smiling.

“Your family wear wolf furs, do they not?” Hoseok asks. He touches Kihyun’s furs from earlier, now draped over the back of his chair. They are inside and the hearth is burning a bright fire. It may be cold outside but Northerner’s, of course, have learnt how to keep warm.

Kihyun nods. “Every noble Northern family has their own furs, my lord,” Kihyun explains, “we are the richest, and the oldest, and so our furs are of the noblest Northern animals. My brother’s wife comes from the strongest of Northern families and so in her youth she wore bear furs. Farther North they wear the furs of white bears, who only survive among the snow that never leaves the ground there.”

Hoseok lifts his hand, tucks a piece of Kihyun’s hair behind his ear. Kihyun clutches the length of his fork tighter, willing himself not to blush again. “You will teach me much of the North in our future,” Hoseok says, voice as soft as the fingers he touches against the shell of Kihyun’s ear.

 

#

 

Kihyun is wandering the castle gardens when he next speaks with Hoseok.

They aren’t so much gardens as they are stripped-bare trees planted inside the castle walls after it had been built. Pretty flowers don’t much grow in the North. They barely have a season for farming here as it is, no one has time to tend to useless, pretty flowers.

Still, Kihyun’s likes it here. It is quiet, and from here you can see the peaks of the mountains that no man has passed and returned from the other side of. They frighten most young children but Kihyun had never grown up like most children, and he has always looked at them with awe.

He is draped in his usual wolfskins when Hoseok finds him, watching a crow pick at seeds through the first, shallow layer of snow. It is, however, Kihyun who speaks first this time.

“Are you not cold, my lord?” Hoseok wears no furs, only thicker clothes than the drafty robes he arrived in. They are darker in colour, too, a more earthy brown, made from leather and heavy cottons. He wears a broach in the shape of a sun, coloured orange and yellow, and if not for Hoseok’s tanned skin it would be the only thing that would give away that he was Southerner.

“The castle walls cut the wind,” Hoseok replies, shrugging. His steps continue, slow and steady, closer and closer to Kihyun. “And I am of the South, as well, and people say that fire flows in our blood.”

Hoseok is near enough for Kihyun to touch him now, but he does not. He turns his face towards the sky. It is clear, today, and it will not snow. Not unless a few clouds roll in in the next few hours.

“In the North,” Kihyun begins, “they say we have ice in our blood. My mother is from the coast, they say sea folk have blood of salt.”

Kihyun feels Hoseok’s thumb press into his chin, bringing Kihyun’s face back down so Hoseok can meet his eyes. He lifts his thumb just a little higher, pushing it against the pouty curve of Kihyun’s bottom lip. “I suppose I will simply have to melt you, then, won’t I?”

 

#

 

“The young lord Hoseok seems very fond of you,” Kihyun’s second brother says to him, mouth upturned into a smug smile as his family mulls over breakfast. The kitchen has brought in bacon and eggs and bread and they drink pale ale to better complement the lightness of breakfast. His sisters drink the juice of oranges, brought with the Southerners on their caravan as a gift.

His eldest brother nearly chokes with laughter on a bite of bacon after Kihyun’s second brother speaks, and his sister’s whisper to each other between giggles.

“I think it sweet,” his brother’s wife counters. She is holding her babe, who is still sound asleep after having just been returned from his wet nurse. The baby has a mess of dark hair on his head, to match his brother’s. He is nothing but North, the salt in his blood from his grandmother’s family long filtered out by the melting of snow. “Courtship is a sweet thing. I enjoyed it very much.”

“I am not a maiden,” Kihyun counters, “I do not need to be courted.”

From the head of the table next to his father, his mother smiles, the way mother’s smile at babes who have been mischievous.

“He is very handsome,” Kihyun’s youngest sister chirps, voice like a pretty bird, but no one is paying her much attention.

Kihyun’s second oldest brother speaks again, “and it would seem,” he says and then takes a sip of his glass of pale ale, “that he courts you anyway, brother.”

Kihyun does not indulge his brother, he decides it would not be worth it. He blinks at him slowly, before he drops his head and returns to his breakfast.

His brother’s son wails then, seemingly coming to life after a deep sleep, moving restlessly in his mother’s arms. All eyes move from Kihyun to the now howling child and Kihyun never supposed he would be so thankful for the crying of babies.

 

#

 

“They will marry in the South,” Hoseok’s father tells Kihyun’s own father, mug of wine clutched in a meaty hand. Kihyun sits quietly between his mother and father, across the table from Hoseok.

Kihyun does not wish to marry in the South. Truly, he would rather not marry at all, but if he must he will retain the traditions of the Northern folk.

“You would have me uproot my entire family for a month's trip to your Kingdom?” Kihyun’s father argues, “my youngest daughter has been without her wet nurse for only just a year, my oldest son’s wife has just birthed him a child. You have but two sons and they are both full grown.”

The Southern Lord’s brow creases and he takes a long sip of wine. Hoseok puts a hand on his father’s arm, eyes trained on Kihyun for just a moment. “Father,” Hoseok says, “I have no qualms of marrying here in the North. We will be taking Kihyun from his home for the rest of his life, surely we can let him have this last celebration among his people?”

The Southern Lord looks out the side of his eye at his son, who holds his gaze. Finally, after what seems like a stretch of time that goes on forever, the Lord sighs, bats his sons hand away and says, “very well. In a week’s time we will marry our sons here.”

Kihyun exhales slow, a breath he hadn’t known he had been holding in. When he looks up at Hoseok he hopes he conveys how thankful he is just through the softness in his eyes

**Author's Note:**

> don't think this be very long but. bear with me.


End file.
